THE SNIPES AND SNIPPETS. 167 



about in search of refreshments. Strange birds 

 are in that crowd sometimes. Not far from Hog 

 Island I have seen a Flamingo in the same field, I 

 think, in which I shot a Merganser another year. 

 Are all these to be reckoned as birds of Bombay? 

 Five or ten miles are nothing to them, and there is 

 not one of them of which it can safely be said that 

 it will not be found on our island. But to describe 

 half of them would defeat the very purpose of these 

 papers, which is not to perplex, but to help the seden- 

 tary Bombayite, who is not a naturalist nor a sports- 

 man, nor a murderer under any name, so that he may 

 recognise the birds that he sees as he takes his morn- 

 ing walk, drives to office, sits in his garden, or enjoys 

 a sail in the harbour. The best way perhaps to accom- 

 plish this in the case of the waterfowl will be to notice 

 chiefly the family features by which one may know to 

 which clan to refer any fowl he may see, and only 

 to describe separately those species which are likely to 

 attract attention, either by their commonness or on 

 some other account. 



Snipe are shot on the Flats every year, but these 

 papers are not for shooters, and the chief peculiarity 

 of the Snipe is that it is rarely seen except by those 

 who seek its destruction. It feeds in secret, where 

 grass and rushes grow in soft mud or shallow water, 

 and does not fly till forced. Then it flies indeed. This 

 constitutes its value for purposes of " sport. " Those 

 who are not sportsmen do indeed see it sometimes 

 under other conditions, when it reclines on a bed of 

 toast, with its poor beak thrust through its own ribs 

 and its footless legs pointing at the ceiling. To 

 recognise it then you need only look at its beak 



